324 COVERT-SIDE SKETCHES. 



parties that the otter is not nearly so destructive as he has 

 been represented to be ; and it has been asserted that he could 

 be kept in reasonable numbers, enough to show sport, without 

 any very great detriment to the angler's prospects. Except in a 

 few places, however, he has a bad time of it, when known to be 

 about, for traps, guns, and all kinds of engines of destruction 

 are brought to bear against him, though, I am pleased to say, 

 often unsuccessfully. It would be a much more sportsmanlike 

 way of getting rid of him to invite a master of otter-hounds to 

 bring his pack, and destroy him in a legitimate manner, when 

 he is known to frequent a certain neighbourhood. Oftentimes 

 it is attempted to get up an impromptu hunt with terriers, curs, 

 and any dogs that can be brought together, but it is generally 

 unsuccessful ; because it is a fact (although little known) that 

 there is great difficulty at first in inducing even hounds to ac- 

 knowledge the scent of an otter, though they are fond enough 

 of it when regularly entered. I once saw the experiment tried 

 with a pack of hounds that had never hunted otter, and, although 

 we could see his " seal " on the mud, and found fish half eaten 

 left in his overnight's ramble, not a hound touched the scent ; 

 and we might as well have been hunting for an elephant, as far 

 as they were concerned. Nay, I am almost convinced that a 

 terrier actually bolted an otter from a hole in the river bank, 

 though I could not clearly see. At any rate, there was such a 

 wave as no fish likely to have been in that water could have 

 made ; but if it was an otter, the hounds passed over his line 

 with a sublime indifference that would have done credit to the 

 cast of Vere de Vere. Yet these hounds were in the habit of 

 hunting more than one kind of game, and, in fact, had for years 

 shown very good all-round sport. Some labourers viewed an 

 otter by the river shortly after we had unsuccessfully tried it. 

 I should certainly like, for reasons I expressed when writing of 

 hare-hunting, to see the chase of the otter much more general 

 than it is. The passion for the chase is so strong in all Eng- 

 lishmen that to give it a legitimate vent is a national benefit. 



